Other Infrastructure Study
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Publication
Digital Economy for Latin America and the Caribbean - Country Diagnostic: Colombia
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2023-06-21)This report analyzes the current state of, challenges to, and opportunities for the development of a digital economy and proposes six policy priorities for the Government of Colombia (GoC). The report is based on the World Bank’s Digital Economy Assessment methodology, which analyzes the digital economy across six pillars or foundational elements: digital infrastructure, digital platforms, digital financial services, digital businesses, digital skills, and trust environment. -
Publication
Argentina: Valuing Water
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-08-17)This report assesses water security in Argentina, using a conceptual framework developed by the World Bank. The effects of the pandemic reinforce the importance of safe access to water, hygiene, and sanitation, both as the first barrier against virus transmission and as an essential factor during recovery to mitigate secondary impacts on livelihoods and community well-being. The clear need to ensure that water is available in sufficient quantity and quality for human and productive uses, together with controlling the effects of the excess of water, highlights its central role in the economy, and in particular in securing the well-being of vulnerable communities. Argentina is already taking key steps to close water security gaps. It is increasing access to water and sanitation services with a focus on the most vulnerable; defining planning instruments such as national water plans; reinforcing tools such as the national information system for water and sanitation, the national water network information system (SNIH) and management and results plans (PGRs) for public service companies; expanding the regulatory framework with law 27,520 on minimum budgets for adaptation to and mitigation of climate change; and creating new entities such as the national directorate of drinking water and sanitation (DNAPyS). This study builds on these efforts and recommends steps to take toward becoming a more water-secure country by 2030. -
Publication
Jobs and Distributive Effects of Infrastructure Investment: The Case of Argentina
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-06)This paper assesses the short-term job generation potential of infrastructure investments in Argentina. The analysis is based on a 2017 Input-Output model with a breakdown of the construction sector into multiple infrastructure subsectors. The disaggregation was possible with a novel database with cost structures for about 70 infrastructure projects. The analysis reveals significant heterogeneity across subsectors of infrastructure investment, with job generation potential ranging between 15,000 and 49,000 annualized direct, indirect and induced jobs in the short-term per US1 billion dollars invested, depending on the type of infrastructure project considered. The results show that public housing and rural road maintenance, followed by railway construction, water and sanitation and urban infrastructure have the highest potential to generate jobs in the short-term. On the other hand, road construction and energy distribution are activities with lower short-term generation potential, but with higher long-term impact on GDP growth according to their elasticities estimates in the literature. The analysis reveals the characteristics of the projects that are determinants of the degree of job generation potential, these include: labor intensity, split between skilled and unskilled labor, ratio of imports to total investment, technology, among others. Infrastructure investment in sectors with high potential for employment generation compares favorably with pure demand stimulus check programs in terms of the effects on income growth for the poor and across all quintiles. However, infrastructure investment in sectors with low employment potential tend to have relatively more limited distributive effects. It is argued that to optimize job generation potential of infrastructure investment in the short-term as a fiscal stimulus, and in the long-term as a foundation for future growth, interventions must be ready for implementation, with low risk of delays, and selected based on sound economic analysis. Also, policymakers must pursue projects with high economic returns to enable a more productive and competitive economy and look for opportunities in which public sector investment can crowd in rather than crowd out private sector investment. -
Publication
Improving Climate Resilience of Federal Road Network in Brazil
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2019-05)Although Brazil is the fifth largest country in the world, it has a relatively low number of natural hazards. However, its exposure to natural hazards has increased relative to other countries because of insufficient preventive actions in the past, resulting in more damage from natural hazards to both infrastructure and human lives than countries of comparable size would incur. Brazil faces an increasing risk of natural disasters, in particular floods and landslides. The objective of the study is to strengthen capacity of geohazard disaster resilience of federal highway infrastructure in Brazil through reviewing disaster risk management (DRM) capacity for federal road infrastructure and case studies of applying innovative methodologies for assessing disaster risk and evaluating economic benefits of resilience countermeasures. Although floods and landslides are the most recurrent natural disasters in Brazil, this report focuses on the latter, leaving floods for future studies. This report carefully describes how three innovative methodologies that, if properly applied, could improve the effectiveness of landslide risk management, thus reducing economic and human impacts. The report begins with diagnostics of the institutional capacities of geohazard risk management at the federal government level in Brazil. Chapters 1 and 2 include the backgrounds of natural disasters, road systems, and geohazards on roads in Brazil and a review of the road geohazard risk management with overviews of the following areas: institutional capacity and coordination, system planning, engineering designs, operation and maintenance, nonstructural measures, and contingency programming. Then, Chapters 3 and 4 describe the case study of application of the three innovative DRM assessment methodologies. Finally, Chapter 5 shows the suggestions and recommendations for the next steps. -
Publication
Mobilizing Private Finance for Development in Latin America and the Caribbean
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-02)The Latin America and the Caribbean Region (LAC) has the largest stock of active PPP investments and the largest pipeline of infrastructure projects by volume globally, reflecting the central role of the private sector in the regional development agenda. Looking ahead, the region is making efforts to close the estimated US$180 billion per year investment gap with further private sector resources by: (i) improving the enabling environment for private investments to take place; and (ii) developing a robust pipeline of bankable projects. The WBG is well-placed to assist the region with financial support and knowledge services, as illustrated by the examples selected for part three of this report. -
Publication
Back to Planning: How to Close Brazil's Infrastructure Gap in Times of Austerity
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-07-12)Why does Brazil continue to lag its peers in the quality of physical infrastructure? What are the implications for growth prospects? What could be done to close the infrastructure gap? These are the key questions addressed in this new report on infrastructure in Brazil. The key argument of the report is that Brazil needs to improve its capacity to plan and prioritize its infrastructure investments. Poorly prioritized and prepared infrastructure investments are a key reason why successive government programs, often with significant budget allocations, have had limited impact. Insufficient planning efforts have meant that what investment takes place has done little to reduce glaring inefficiencies and losses. With more efforts upstream to prepare a robust pipeline of projects, Brazil is in an excellent position to attract commercial financing to its infrastructure. With more attention to sector planning and governance, losses could be reduced and the effective resources available to infrastructure could be roughly doubled. This in turn would help boost growth and improve the quality of public services without the need for much additional public money. The report analyzes recent government measures such as the creation of the PPI and develops recommendations how infrastructure can become an engine of economic recovery in Brazil. -
Publication
Seismic Risk Reduction Strategy for Public School Buildings in Peru
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2017-02)The Ministry of Education of Peru (MINEDU), through the General Directorate for School Infrastructure (DIGEIE), prepared the National School Infrastructure Plan to 2025 (PNIE). Within this framework, the MINEDU commissioned the National Institute of Statistics and Information (INEI) with carrying out the School Infrastructure Census (CIE) which started on September 2013 and was completed in 2014. The MINEDU requested the World Bank’s technical assistance for the analysis of the results obtained from the CIE as well as for devising a strategy to reduce seismic vulnerability and for the formulation of the PNIE. Under this program, a nationwide probabilistic seismic risk assessment of school infrastructure was carried out, which constitutes the basis for defining the seismic risk reduction strategies and for setting intervention priorities to optimize the required investments. In turn, the risk reduction strategy aims mainly to reduce the risk of death or injuries in the educational community to reduce damages to the property and infrastructure, and to minimize disruption of the educational services in the event of an earthquake. This note presents a summary of the seismic risk assessment of the school infrastructure countrywide and a strategy for reducing its vulnerability. This study is an integral part of the main results of a program funded by the Government of Japan and the global facility for disaster reduction and recovery (GFDRR), the main objective of which is to integrate disaster risk management into infrastructure sectors. -
Publication
Peru - Recent Economic Development in Infrastructure : Volume1. Investing in Infrastructure as an Engine for Growth - Spending More, Faster and Spending Better
(Washington, DC, 2010-12)This report provided the Government of Peru with a comprehensive strategic assessment of three key infrastructure sectors: water/sanitation, transport and electricity, and to propose selected recommendations on how the Government could improve the performance of these sectors. Peru's public expenditure framework shows some rigidities, a number of which were introduced when fiscal resources were scarce or, more recently, because of concerns about a possible risk of inflation. The implementation of the stimulus package has required a laborious transition to remove bottlenecks to faster public spending, sometimes at the risk of affecting the mechanisms that help ensure the quality of public expenditures. The Peruvian authorities have been able to accelerate public investments in infrastructure but little thinking has been dedicated to improving the efficiency and effectiveness of such investments. The report concludes that Peru should focus on: prioritizing infrastructure investments through improved planning, promoting efficiency in infrastructure delivery, enhancing sub-national governments' capacity with respect to infrastructure, and leveraging the participation of the private sector. -
Publication
Peru - Recent Economic Development in Infrastructure : Volume 2. Investing in Infrastructure as an Engine for Growth - Spending More, Faster, and Spending Better
(Washington, DC, 2010-12)This report provided the Government of Peru with a comprehensive strategic assessment of three key infrastructure sectors: water/sanitation, transport and electricity, and to propose selected recommendations on how the Government could improve the performance of these sectors. Peru's public expenditure framework shows some rigidities, a number of which were introduced when fiscal resources were scarce or, more recently, because of concerns about a possible risk of inflation. The implementation of the stimulus package has required a laborious transition to remove bottlenecks to faster public spending, sometimes at the risk of affecting the mechanisms that help ensure the quality of public expenditures. The Peruvian authorities have been able to accelerate public investments in infrastructure but little thinking has been dedicated to improving the efficiency and effectiveness of such investments. The report concludes that Peru should focus on: prioritizing infrastructure investments through improved planning, promoting efficiency in infrastructure delivery, enhancing sub-national governments' capacity with respect to infrastructure, and leveraging the participation of the private sector. -
Publication
Understanding Sector Performance : The Case of Utilities in Latin America and the Caribbean
(World Bank, 2009-07-29)This report provides innovative approaches to better understand infrastructure sector performance by focusing on the links between key indicators for private and public utilities, and changes in ownership, regulatory agency governance, and corporate governance, among other dimensions. By linking inputs and outputs over the last 15 years, the analysis proposes key determinants that have impacted sector performance in infrastructure sectors in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). It is about understanding how and to what extent the effect of such elements result in significant changes in the performance of infrastructure service provision. This report focuses on the distribution segment of basic infrastructure services. It covers electricity distribution, water distribution and sewerage, and fixed telecommunications. More specifically, the report does: i) depict sector performance with a broad set of indicators that describes the current situation as well its evolution during the last 15 years; ii) propose analytical frameworks for themes less developed in the literature such as regulatory governance and corporate governance for state-owned enterprises (SOEs); iii) benchmark the institutional designs of the regulatory agencies in the region for the water and electricity sectors; and iv) analyze the relationship between sector performance and regulation, private sector participation, and corporate governance.